Nearly 1,000 Alachua County Public Schools students earned Scholar Awards for the 2025-26 school year, the latest figures from the College Board show. In all, 981 ACPS students were recognized for strong performance on multiple exams.
The largest share reached the top tier. Four hundred fifty-five students earned Scholar with Distinction, 145 received Scholar with Honors and 381 were named Scholars. Those distinctions are tied to score thresholds on multiple exams: Scholar with Distinction requires an average score of at least 3.5 across exams and scores of 3 or higher on at least five total exams, while Scholar with Honors requires an average of at least 3.25 and scores of 3 or higher on at least four exams. Scholars must score 3 or higher on three or more exams.
The recognition matters because scores of 3 or above can translate into college credit or advanced placement at many colleges and universities. This year, the College Board also recognized 72 ACPS students who earned the Capstone Diploma and 39 who received the Seminar and Research Certificate, adding another layer to the district’s results.
Still, the Scholar figures do not tell the whole story about academic achievement in Alachua County. Many of the district’s highest-achieving students take Cambridge and International Baccalaureate exams instead of exams, so the College Board totals capture only part of the picture. Even so, six of the district’s high schools had students recognized in all three Scholar categories, a sign that the district’s pipeline reached across multiple campuses.
What remains unresolved is which six high schools produced students across all three Scholar categories. The College Board numbers make clear that the district had a broad and unusually deep showing this year, but the school-by-school breakdown still decides where that success was most concentrated.
